Food products are sometimes subjected to heating and cooling while enclosed in sealed packets or pouches. Such pouches permit a liquid or semiliquid product such as ketchup or soup, or prepared quantifies of product, to be treated in a continuous process. Pouches are commonly treated to heating or cooling in water baths, and are advanced by belt, auger or other means through various conditions until the food reaches the desired end state.
Treated food pouches are then packaged for storage or shipment. Because the pouches are packed in corrugated paperboard containers, it is important that no water remain on the pouches which might compromise the integrity of the corrugated containers. Furthermore, excess water on the pouch surfaces will require additional cooling cost if the pouches are refrigerated or frozen. It is thus essential that the pouches which leave the treating water bath be fully dried prior to packaging.
A common method of obtaining the requisite dryness is to station operators with cloth towels on the packaging line to manually remove unwanted moisture. In addition to the drawbacks of inconsistency in drying of a manual operation, the complications and cost of staffing and managing the dryers present an added burden and add to the end cost of the food product.
Simple ducted jets of air blown onto the pouches provide unacceptable results, due to the tendency of the pouches to be blown upstream, and the water droplets from one pouch to be blown onto the succeeding pouch.
What is needed is an apparatus which automatically removes moisture from food product pouches in an economical and consistent fashion.